Patients Association spokeswoman Katherine Murphy said: "Too many people are dying from these infections. We must learn from other countries such as Holland which have got infection rates close to zero.

"That is what we should be aiming for. We need to make NHS chief executives more accountable and ring-fence infection control budgets as it is to easy to raid them when there are cuts."

She also said all patients should be screened - at the moment only those at highest risk are routinely tested as they enter hospital.

In November 2004, then health secretary John Reid pledged MRSA rates would be halved by April 2008.

But government memo, sent to ministers by a Department of Health official last year, predicted it would only be cut by a third by then.

The same memo said C. difficile, a stomach bug which can cause potentially life-threatening bowel inflammation problems, was now "endemic throughout the health service, with virtually all trusts reporting cases".

Targets

Ministers have asked NHS trusts to set their own targets to reduce C. difficile rates.

The latest figures confirm the problems - although the rate of increase in C. difficile is slowing.

From 2004 to 2005, there was a 17% rise compared to the 8% being reported last year.

There were 1,542 MRSA bloodstream infections from October to December 2006 - 7% down on the previous quarter.

The HPA does not look at deaths although figures from 2004 show that MRSA was mentioned on over 1,000 death certificates in England and Wales, while C difficile was listed on over 2,000.

Dr Mark Enright, an expert on infections from Imperial College London, said: "C. difficile has hit the NHS out of nowhere and we are still getting our head around dealing with it."

Shadow Health Secretary Andrew Lansley said: "The government has badly let down NHS staff and the patients they care for."